HE SCIENCE 
OF HISTORY 
ANDTHEHOPE 
OF MANKIND 



BENOY- KUMAR- SARKAR 




Qass 

Book >5- 7v 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY AND 
THE HOPE OF MANKIND 



THE 

SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

AND THE 

HOPE OF MANKIND 



BENOY KUMAR SARKAR, M.A. 

Lecturer in Political Science, Bengal National College, Calcutta 
(National Cowicil of Education, Bengal) 

Author of " The Aids to General Culture Series " in English and 

' The Science of Education and the Inductive Method of Teaching Series ' 

in Bengali 



LONGMANS, GREEN, AND GO. 

39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON 

NEW YORK, BOMBAY AND CALCUTTA 

1912 

All rights reserved 



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PREFACE 

THE present work is based on 
the Lectures on the Science of 
History which I dehvered to my classes 
in History at the Bengal National 
College, Calcutta. My object was to 
survey, not historically but according to 
the philosophico-comparative method, 
the phenomena of civilisation and point 
out the laws or generalisations that 
may be deduced out of the facts of 
universal history. 

Human civilisation, like physical 
facts and phenomena, requires to be 
studied in such a way as to lead to 
the detection of uniformities in the 



PREFACE 



sequences and co-existences of social 
events and movements. History has 
to be put on the same level with 
physics and other natural sciences, so 
that predictions may be possible in the 
social world as in the physical. 

My best thanks are due to Pro- 
fessor Radhakumud Mukerji, M.A., of 
the National Council of Education, 
Bengal, for kindly looking over the 
proofs. 

B. K. SAKKAE. 

Calcutta, 

June, 1911. 



VI 



CONTENTS 



SECTION PAGE 

I. PEOBLEMS OF HISTORY . - . .1 

II. THE SCOPE AND FUNCTION OF HISTORY 8 

III. THE SCIENCE OF LIFE . . .13 

IV. THE WOELD-FOECES IN ANCIENT AND 

MEDIEVAL HISTORY . . . 24 

V. INTEENATIONAL POLITICS AND NA- 
TIONAL ADVANCEMENTS IN MODEEN 
TIMES 33 

VI. INTEENATIONAL RELATIONS AND THE 
FOEMS OP GOVEENMENTAL MACHI- 
NEEY 50 

VII. EELATIVITY OF EELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS 
AND OF OTHEE ASPECTS OF HUMAN 
LIFE TO THE CONJUNCTUEE OF 
CIRCUMSTANCES . . . .57 

VIII. EECAPITULATION . . . .66 

IX. THE WOELD'S GEEATEST MEN . . 68 

X. THE OUTLOOK 75 

vii 



SECTION I 

PROBLEMS OF HISTORY 

MANY strange things have hap- 
pened in the history of the 
world. There have been cases in 
which the efforts of individuals or 
societies have been directed towards 
the spread of a new religion, but the 
result has been the creation of a 
new state or the making of a power- 
ful military community. Sometimes 
the ruling classes or the subjects have 
endeavoured to raise the status of 
their country by developing its secular 
and political interests, but a new re- 
ligious system with its peculiar dog- 
mas and doctrines has displaced the 
old mythology and renovated the spiri- 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

tual life of the people. Many instances 
are recorded of conflicts between states 
which ensue through certain bones of 
contention, but which have been con- 
cluded by treaties settling quite diffe- 
rent problems. The succession ques- 
tion owing to vacancy of the throne 
in one state has often been the occasion 
of a world-wide struggle and led to 
the alteration of the political bound- 
aries of several states. There is a 
dynastic and political rivalry between 
two princes, but altogether new and 
unheard-of peoples slowly and silently 
acquire a place in the polity of nations. 
While, again, philosophers and 
theorists have been engaged in the 
diffusion of a new thought or the de- 
vising of measures for the cultivation 
of the arts and sciences, the advance- 
ment of learning and the spread of 
2 



PROBLEMS OF HISTORY 

education, the people have been blessed 
with the acquisition of the privileges of 
self-government, democracy, and free 
constitutional life. Or, perhaps, the 
politicians and statesmen have been 
actively agitating for introducing re- 
forms into the Legislative Assemblies 
and National Councils, the whole- 
hearted devotion of some of the ablest 
men of the country has been applied 
to the discussion of the best systems 
of election and representation, the 
study of the proper relations between 
the rulers and the ruled, or the deter- 
mination of the duties of the governors 
and the rights and privileges of the 
governed, but in the meanwhile there 
has emerged a new consciousness 
among the people, the sign of a new 
life, through honest intellectual curi- 
osity and scepticism, a taste for inde- 
3 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

pendent thought and discussion, and 
the rise of a new Literature and 
Science. 
/ In fact, traces of the beginnings 
/ of movements are seldom to be met 
with at the close. There have been 
many movements which were started 
under the impulse of a hope of indus- 
trial improvement and commercial 
success, but which have ended in a new 
arrangement of social forces giving 
rise to modifications in the character 
and extent of the State. Pohtical re- 
. generation has often been the objective, 
but the result has been the develop- 
ment of national wealth. Or, again, 
the establishment of uniformity in 
religious life and thought has been the 
spring of an individual's action, but 
the annihilation of a whole people's in- 
dustry and commerce has been the con- 
4 



PROBLEMS OF HISTORY 

sequence. While sometimes patriots 
have confined their ambition solely to 
the mere establishment of a constitu- 
tional form of government by limit- 
ing the rights of the sovereign and 
extending the privileges of the sub- 
jects, they have been startled by 
more momentous results than were 
within their ken, viz., the declaration 
of an absolute autonomy and national 
independence. In one state the sove- 
reign commits a political or a strategic 
blunder, but in another kingdom a 
political revolution is effected and a 
limited monarchy takes the place of 
the old regime of royal absolutism. 
Two states are measuring their 
strength against each other, but a 
third and an altogether independent 
state comes into the whirlpool of their 
politics and undergoes the fate of 
5 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

double or triple partitions among the 
neighbours. 

Observers of such freaks of Nature 
in the phenomena of the human world 
are naturally expected to doubt if there 
be any law or definite principle govern- 
ing man's progress and decay. If 
the affairs of man are very strange 
and have no natural and necessary 
connection between one another, if 
the rise and fall of nations, the pro- 
pagation of religions or the extinction 
of industries, the loss of liberty or 
the foundation of a constitution are 
really the results of accidents and 
cannot be foreseen, what can possibly 
be the aims and ideals of human life, 
what the sources of inspiration that may 
encourage man in his struggle for exis- 
tence ? How would a nation that has 
been for some time a contributor to 
6 



PROBLEMS OF HISTORY 

the world's culture and civilisation try 
to maintain its dignity and prestige? 
What are the means by which an 
infant or a degenerate community 
can hope to rise to the standing of 
advanced nations ? Is there any good 
in the efforts and energies of agitators, 
martyrs, and missionaries ? What is 
the value of the work and perseverance 
of religious preachers, and social re- 
formers, patriots, and philanthropists ? 



SECTION II 

THE SCOPE AND FUNCTION OF 
HISTORY 

ANSWERS to such queries regard- 
ing the hopes and the future 
of mankind are to be expected of the 
historian. But of late the cultivation of 
learning has been considerably guided 
by the principle of the Division of 
Labour. The tendency has been 
towards a breaking up of the province 
of knowledge into several depart- 
ments and the relegation of each to a 
separate treatment, with the result that 
the sciences have become specialised 
and their scope greatly narrowed. 

Historical studies, also, have been 
attacked by this principle of isolation 
and specialisation, and have had their 
8 



ITS SCOPE AND FUNCTION 

boundaries confined exclusively to the 
facts and phenomena of the statal life 
of a people. Workers in the field 
of history consider their sole responsi- 
bility to be the study of only the 
political affairs of a community, e.g., 
administration of the state, interna- 
tional diplomacy, wars and treaties, 
expansion and secession of territories, 
growth or decay of the sense of 
nationality or political unity. Only 
such facts or principles as are directly 
or indirectly connected with the 
political aspects of human life receive 
their whole attention and absorb 
their total activity. The tendency 
of historians nowadays is to neglect 
completely the study of the influences 
on State of Man's domestic, social, 
industrial, religious, and intellectual 
life, and of the diverse effects on 
9 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

human life and institutions of the 
working of the poHtical machinery. 
For this is considered to be the func- 
tion of special classes of scholars, e.g,^ 
sociologists, economists, and peda- 
gogists. 

The introduction of the principle 
of Division of Labour in the culti- 
vation of science has no doubt led 
to rapid growth and development of 
the several sciences, and by differen- 
tiating and rigidly demarcating their 
scope and function has helped forward 
the speedy realisation of the end of 
each. But this differentiation and 
limitation of the range of study has 
been attended with the necessary evils 
and imperfections of the consequent 
diversity and multiplicity. For the 
absence of uniformity and of synthetic 
comprehensive treatment is unfavour- 
10 



ITS SCOPE AND FUNCTION 

able to the discovery and formulation 
of universal principles and fundamental 
laws that may be generalised out of the 
facts and phenomena of the world. 
History has, thus, on the one hand, 
been able to supply out of its general 
stock special facts and materials for an 
altogether new branch of learning, viz.. 
Political Science, and has thus contri- 
buted to the richness and variety of 
human knowledge. But these spe- 
cialised activities have, on the other 
hand, withdrawn the attention of 
scholars from the study of the hopes 
and aspirations of man, the progress 
and decay of civilisations, and the ulti- 
mate gains and losses of humanity. 

Man is not wholly a political animal, 

and therefore the state alone is not the 

sole indicator and standard in regard to 

human happiness and misery. No 

11 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

knowledge about man can be complete 
until and unless it is based on a study 
of all human passions and tendencies, 
institutions and activities. And so 
history must necessarily be incomplete 
and quite unable to guess the future 
destiny of mankind or to suggest the 
lines of advance suitable to any stage, 
so long as it does not concern itself 
with the whole of human life and its 
thousand and one manifestations. The 
historian, therefore, will have to use 
at every step the laws of life and living 
organisms. Biology is thus the true 
basis of Sociology and the science of 
History. Founded on the science of 
Life, History will be competent to 
formulate clear and definite principles 
about the course of human progress, 
the development of society and the 
evolution of civilisation. 
12 



SECTION III 

THE SCIENCE OF LIFE 

THE development of all living 
organisms is effected through 
certain energies and substances that 
are conducive to the growth and 
manifestation of life. It is the envi- 
ronment and physical surroundings 
that supply these life-sustaining factors 
to the organisms. And this physical 
universe is not only the feeder and 
sustainer of living beings, it is also the 
field of their activity as well as the 
abode in which they grow and re- 
produce themselves. Hence the action 
and reaction between the living organ- 
ism and the environment regulate all 
the conditions of its life-history. 
13 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

Now, all those forces and materials 
that constitute the en\dronment, e,g,^ 
light, heat, air, water, soils, food sub- 
stances, etc., are not equally necessary 
to the life and development of every 
organism; in fact, some are positively 
harmful and injurious to its interests. 
Besides, among the living beings them- 
selves there are relations of mutual 
alliance and rivalry. It is the interac- 
tion and resultant of all the forces of 
Nature, both favourable and unfavour- 
able to life, that determine the develop- 
ment and growth of every individual 
organism. And so the form and char- 
acteristics of every living being depend 
on the nature and strength of these 
contending forces. 

Thus, in the vegetable and animal 
worlds the varieties of form and colour, 
structural and external characteristics, 
14 



THE SCIENCE OF LIFE 

the habits of Hfe and habitats, move- 
ments of limbs and other organs, as 
well as the methods of reproduction 
and rearing, are all influenced by and 
adapted to the varying conditions of 
the environment. The plants and 
animals of land as well as water have 
different modes of life and forms of 
body adapted to their different abodes 
and surroundings. Terrestrial plants 
and animals, again, display diversity of 
structure and characteristics owing to 
the variety of sets of favourable and 
unfavourable circumstances amidst 
which they are placed. 

The maintenance of life as well as 
the propagation of the species, also, do 
not depend solely on the individual 
life of the organism. In fact, every 
aspect of its life is influenced by the 
whole environment surrounding it. 
15 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

The operation of the manifold forces 
of nature, the attempts of each organ- 
ism to utihse the environment accord- 
ing to its own needs, and the modi- 
fication of its organs through the 
assimilation of the surrounding sub- 
stances — all contribute their quota to 
its special growth and development. 
The life and individuality of each 
single organism are controlled and 
influenced by the sum-total of all those 
processes and products of Nature that 
arise out of the needs of every other 
organism for growth and development. 
And the modifications in the living 
world owing to the mutual alliance and 
rivalry of the organisms as well as 
the new forces that are being per- 
petually created by the eternal struggle 
for existence in the universe have their 
part to play in moulding the life-history 
16 



THE SCIENCE OF LIFE 

of every organism. No organism can 
realise its individual perfection abso- 
lutely independent of all other organ- 
isms. All the world-forces are jointly 
responsible for every manifestation of 
the Hfe of an organism, so that the de- 
velopment, liberty, and degeneracy of 
one are inextricably bound up with 
the development, liberty, and de- 
generacy of all other organisms. This 
is the fundamental truth about the 
sphere of human beings. 
) Human life is also in this way in- 
fluenced and controlled by the forces 
and substances in the universe. The 
growth, development, and liberty of 
Man depend on the resultant of all the 
mutual relations between the various 
agencies of the social and physical 
environments. It is the interaction of 
all friendly and inimical world-forces 
17 c 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

that gives to each human being its 
pecuUar external characteristics and 
endows it with its proper mental and 
moral outfit. 

Thus the formation of society as 
well as the creation of state, organisa- 
tion of education as well as the culti- 
vation of letters, the institution of 
religious practices as well as the 
foundation of institutions, in fact, all 
aspects of human life, are influenced 
and modified by the social and 
physical atmosphere in which man 
is placed, and vary with the vary- 
ing circumstances that diversify it. 
Just as plants and other lower organ- 
isms display diversity of structure and 
characteristics in order to adapt them- 
selves to the play of diverse agencies 
in the universe, so man also manifests 
various aspects of life and character 
18 



THE SCIENCE OF LIFE 

under various sets of influences, takes 
recourse to various modes of living, and 
preserves his continuity and indivi- 
duality under various forms adapted 
to the varying conditions of the social 
and physical world. The state, rehgion, 
literature, and other manifestations of 
human life assume in this way different 
characteristics of form and spirit under 
different circumstances. 

The motive of man in having re- 
course to social and physical changes 
of his organism is to adapt these mani- 
festations and weapons of life to the 
varying needs and conditions of the 
struggle for existence. Political move- 
ments as well as religious propagan- 
dism, planting of colonies as well as 
the development of industries, are thus 
regulated by the play of a thousand 
and one forces to which human life is 
19 



^HiE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

subject in this universe. The growth 
in prosperity and freedom of a com- 
munity or the decay of its life and 
liberty does not depend solely on its 
own needs of advancement and pro- 
gress, and is not effected solely by 
the working of its own resources. 

No man can ever exist by ignoring 
any one of the forces and materials 
that make up the world he Hves in ; 
he has to reckon the agencies that 
are perpetually influencing himself as 
well as other men. A study of the 
conditions of other men is thus the 
means to a proper understanding of his 
own situation in the struggle for exist- 
ence. And, similarly, in the case 
of a community or a people, the 
first problem in the struggle is to 
discover the friends and foes — the 
favourable and unfavourable circum- 
20 



THE SCIENCE OF LIFE 

stances that may co-operate with or 
miUtate against its growth and develop- 
ment ; for all its arrangements and 
organisations will have to be adjusted 
to the requirements thereby suggested. 
f The progress and degeneration of 
/any of the races of men are thus the 
I indirect effects and subsidiary results 
■ of the development of mankind as a 
whole. What an individual nation 
regards as the principal factor of its 
own progress, as the chief and indis 
pensable element of its own glory, is 
nothing but a mere by-product of 
the general process of the whole of 
human affairs. Thus considered, na- 
tional achievements and self-realisations 
at any one epoch are only some of 
the symptoms of the total world-culture 
of the age ; — and though ends in them- 
selves from the standpoint of race- 
Si 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

consciousness, are mere means to, or 
unlooked-for consequences of, the situ- 
ation of the human race at the time. 
The growth or decay of a Hterature 
and the acquisition or loss of Uberty 
are, no doubt, of momentous con- 
sequence to the life and fortunes of a 
nation ; but in respect of the grand con- 
summation of human ci\dlisation these 
are temporary and accidental pheno- 
mena, intimately connected with the 
multitudinous ups and downs of a 
thousand other communities. 

The prosperity and adversity, growth 
and decay, as well as freedom and 
subjection of each individual com- 
munity at any one time, in one word, 
the destiny of each nation acts and 
is acted upon by the conjuncture of 
all the forces of the Universe. And 
this is created by the international 
22 



THE SCIENCE OF LIFE 

relations of the epoch and indicated 
by the position of the political and 
social centre of gravity of the world 
brought about by them. Hence, for 
a proper understanding of any of the 
conditions of a single people, it is abso- 
lutely necessary to realise the whole 
situation of the human world at the 
time, and minutely study the array of 
world-forces that has been the result 
of mutual intercourse between the 
several peoples in social, economic, 
intellectual, and political matters. 



23 



SECTIOIS^ IV 

THE WORLD-FORCES IN ANCIENT 
AND MEDIAEVAL HISTORY 

THE chief centres of ancient civi- 
lisation were India, Persia, 
China, Egypt, Babylon, and Greece. 
The contribution of each of these to 
the culture of humanity was greatly 
influenced and modified by its inter- 
course with the civilised and bar- 
barous peoples of the other parts of 
the world. Besides being controlled 
by these sociological factors, the 
freedom and subjugation of countries, 
as well as the opulence and adversity 
of peoples in the ancient world, de- 
pended also on the climatological and 
agricultural conditions of the several 
24 



THE WORLD-FORCES IN HISTORY 

habitable tracts, as well as the physical 
and natural means of defence from 
foreign inroads. These social and 
physical conditions of the surrounding 
universe are responsible for the wars 
and alliances, inter-mixtures and inter- 
marriages, religious rapprochements 
and territorial expansions, industrial 
developments and ethnical assimila- 
tions that make up the Drama of 
Ancient History. 

Such inter-racial connections and 
mutual intercourse between peoples 
of various origins have left their stamp 
on the culture and civilisation of the 
Egyptians and Babylonians. So also 
Hellenic civilisation was not an isolated 
growth, but was the product of the 
world-influences of the classic age. 
The little city-states of Greece de- 
veloped their peculiar type of life 
26 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

and thought under the conditions sup- 
plied by the states of antiquity as well 
as the contemporary "barbarians." 
Their colonial and military systems, 
their commercial poUcies, their 
political unions and confederations, 
were the direct outcome of Phoenician, 
Egyptian, and Persian influences. The 
various stages in the history of the 
Roman Republic were likewise in- 
fluenced both in form and spirit by 
contact with the life and thought of 
the innumerable peoples who came 
under the sway of the Romans. 

The manners and customs, religious 
institutions and social practices, as well 
as the art and literature of India, owe 
their special characteristics to the 
social, economic, political, and rehgious 
intercourse of India with the peoples 
of Tibet, China, and the diverse neo- 
26 



THE WORLD-FORCES IN HISTORY 

Greek states, as well as the influence of 
multifarious aboriginal and non- Aryan 
rites and ceremonies. In like manner 
the literature and life of the kingdoms 
of the Hellenistic world that came 
into being under the movement for 
the expansion of Greece begun by 
Alexander were the outcome, in vary- 
ing degrees, of the contact between the 
East and the AVest ; and in politics as 
in philosophy, industrial as well as 
social life, represented the processes 
and products of the assimilation that 
was consciously at work under the 
altered conditions of the world. 

In this way the individuality and 
peculiar type of social and literary 
life of each of the ancient nations of 
the world were developed simulta- 
neously with, and even as the results 
of, the individuality and nationality 
27 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

of the other peoples. AU the types 
of ancient culture evolved their special 
structural characteristics and differen- 
tiated themselves into separate socio- 
pohtical crystals by influencing and 
modifying one another, and hence may 
be looked upon as more or less the 
joint-products of certain systems of 
world-forces. 

The kaleidoscopic changes that 
marked the state - systems of the 
Middle Ages were likewise due to the 
stir and turmoil produced by social 
and political intercourse of peoples 
with one another. Those very 
barbaric races who had during the 
preceding epochs excited the military 
ambition of the established powers, 
whose very existence had, in fact, taxed 
the strategic abihty of the rulers of the 
border-lands and frontier - provinces, 
28 



THE WORLD-FORCES IN HISTORY 

were under the new conditions no 
longer despised as being outside the 
zone of civilisation, but had to be 
received by the civihsed nations as 
members of the same system of life 
and thought. 

The same influence that had led to 
the migration of the Aryans in primi- 
tive times were now at work in making 
the Teutonic tribes leave their original 
homes and seek new settlements 
and careers in unknown and untried 
lands. While the process of " barbaris- 
ing" was going on in one quarter of the 
globe, a camel-driver of the Arabian 
deserts promulgated a new faith, and 
under its impulse innumerable tribes 
and sub-tribes started on a career of 
religious fanaticism. The result was 
that the old centres of civilisation in 
Europe and Asia became Teutonised 
29 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

and Islamised and began to be the 
seedbeds of new thought and culture. 
The poHtical boundaries of the states 
of Mediasval Asia and Europe had 
to undergo rapid changes. The decHne 
and fall of the Roman Empire, forma- 
tion of new independent states, the 
gradual establishment of autonomy 
in Britain, Gaul, and the Iberian 
peninsula, wars of religion and 
expansion of theocracies, rise and 
development of Saracenic kingdoms, 
fall of ancient states and creation of 
new state-systems in India, revolts and 
secessions throughout the length and 
breadth of the known world, destruc- 
tion of Hberties and loss of autonomies, 
origin of new principles of unity and 
association — in fact, all those ceaseless 
transformations that characterise the 
stirring times — received their peculiar 
30 



THE WOELD-FORCES IN HISTORY 

stamp and trend by being thrown 
into the midst of one another, each 
having left its mark on the others. 
The explanation of each of these is to 
be sought in the same sets of forces 
that were engendered by the grand 
whirlpool of human affairs ; and, so, 
all are to be regarded as members of 
one and the same system of world 
influences. Conquests and subjuga- 
tions were the order of the day; and 
the Teutonic victories in the Roman- 
ised world as well as the Saracenic 
conquests in Roman and non-Roman 
Europe and the various parts of 
Asia were the outcome of the same 
socio-political environment. The sub- 
jugation of Britain by foreigners is the 
European counterpart of the same 
movement that led to the overthrow 
of the Hindus in certain parts of India 
31 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

by the followers of Islam. Subjection 
and independence, progress and degene- 
ration, national achievement and decay 
were not the fruit of the activities 
of individual peoples, and cannot be 
explained solely by the. heroism or 
degeneracy of the nations themselves. 
These were not the results of isolated 
movements, but were the joint-pro- 
ducts of the whole process of human 
affairs. 



32 



SECTION V 

INTERNATIONAL POLITICS AND 
NATIONAL ADVANCEMENTS IN 
MODERN TIMES 

IT is also a fact that the fortunes of 
all those peoples who in modern 
times have contributed to the glory 
and wealth of human civilisation by 
winning their independence and auto- 
nomy from the grasp of foreign rulers, 
or by limiting the rights and powers 
of the sovereigns, were not made by 
their own efforts alone, but were mainly 
directed by the conjuncture of circum- 
stances and the environment of forces 
and opportunities that were created 
by the mutual alliance and rivalry of 
the other nations. 

33 p 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

Take, for example, the declaration 
of Dutch Independence, which towards 
the close of the sixteenth century- 
threw a new power into European 
politics. 

The power and prestige of the 
Spanish Habsburgs, the rulers of the 
Netherlands, had for a long time been 
on the wane. The monarchs of France, 
having consolidated their kingdom, 
were extending their arms of conquest 
and expansion, and so came into 
natural conflict with the Spanish 
Emperor, over whose dominions the 
sun never set. The Holy Roman 
Emperor was a Habsburg, and hence 
his relative, but had no sympathy with 
the proselytising Catholicism of the 
Spanish autocrat. The diplomatic 
Elizabeth of England also pursued a 
religious policy which ran directly 
34 



INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 

counter to the Catholic Emperor's 
. system of persecution. 

In the meantime the Inquisition, 
set up by Phihp II. to estabhsh 
rehgious uniformity and centrahse 
both poUtics and rehgion, had the 
baneful effect of crushing the national 
industries, by compelling the Pro- 
testant and Moorish artisans to seek 
refuge in the hospitable anti- Catholic 
countries. Economic resources having 
been thus hollowed out by the 
expulsion of the skilled labourers and 
organisers, the finances of the Empire 
presented a miserable condition. Thus 
just at the time when the people of the 
Netherlands, unable to bear the political 
and religious tyranny, were organised 
for war under the most patriotic and 
desperate leaders, the despot's sinews of 
war had become effete and inefficient. 
35 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

Add to this the division of energy 
that was necessitated by the simulta- 
neous conflict with England and the 
possibility of a breach with France, 
and we get an idea of the manner in 
which the decay of Spain, and the 
political ascendancy of France, indus- 
trial and commercial developments of 
Protestant countries, and the political 
and reUgious independence of the 
Dutch Republic, came about as the 
joint products of the same system of 
European politics. We cannot explain 
the rise of one people without refer- 
ence to the fall of another, or the 
economic prosperity of one if we neg- 
lect the political triumph of another. 

Just as the interests of the whole 
of Europe were involved in the con- 
tinental affairs that ultimately led to 
the absolute autonomy of the Nether- 
36 



INTE^RNATIONAL POLITICS 

lands and the decadence of the Spanish 
Habsburgs, so also the Revolution of 
1688 which led to the dethronement 
of James II. and the establishment of 
constitutional monarchy in England 
was only one of the indirect and 
accidental consequences of those series 
of European movements which were 
organised against the absolute Caesaro- 
papism of Louis XIV., le grand 
monarque of France, through the in- 
strumentality of his personal rival, 
William Prince of Orange. 

This " glorious Revolution " was not 
effected in England in the interest 
of herself and through the heroism of 
Englishmen alone, but was simply a 
means to the ends of a foreign hero. 
The European situation had come to 
such a pass that even the Pope of 
Rome had to accept liberal tendencies 
37 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

and sympathise with the Protestant 
movements. Louis' poKcy of rehgious 
centrahsation had been rapidly robbing 
the Pope of his secular and political 
influence, and so the head of the 
Roman Catholic Church found it ex- 
pedient to side with the Calvinistic 
William, as the champion of European 
liberties, and even oppose James II., 
the most extreme of all the advocates 
of Catholicism. 

As the German Emperor had for a 
long time been involved in Turkish 
politics, and Spain had become para- 
lysed, the hope of Europe for deliver- 
ance from the all-seizing ambition of 
the Grand Monarch rested on the 
national resources of England and the 
heroism and organising ability of the 
Prince of Orange. But England could 
not be made to take part in the 
38 



INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 

general European conflict until the 
constitutional struggle between the 
King and the people was brought to 
a satisfactory close, and the miserable 
policy of the later Stuart kings of 
seeking subsidy and help from the 
French monarch was abolished and 
replaced by the practice of receiving 
grants from the Parliament by timely 
concessions. 

One of the first tasks of William's 
life-work was, therefore, the accom- 
plishment of the English Revolution. 
It was thus only a stepping-stone to 
the grand European mission of his 
life ; at once a concomitant and a 
means to the general continental move- 
ments of the time. 

Martin Luther started his scheme of 
religious reformation in the sixteenth 
century ; it took about a century and a 
39 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

half to bring the religious disputes of 
Europe to an end. But the wars of 
Religion were not solely the outcome 
of the spiritual needs of humanity. 
These contests were inspired and 
directed by the needs of political and 
economic advancement which the 
various princes and peoples of Europe 
wanted to secure from the secular 
ambitions of the head of the Roman 
Church. 

Thus the arrangement of the several 
powers into neutrals, allies, and belli- 
gerents was dictated not simply by 
religious considerations but by their 
financial, industrial, and political 
interests. The Reformation was, in 
fact, a political necessity, and national 
churches were the inevitable counter- 
parts of nation-states. Consequently 
lovers of economic independence and 
40 



INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 

national unity began to range them- 
selves on the side of religious toler- 
ation and freedom of conscience; 
and so not only theologians and 
religious leaders, but statesmen and 
politicians, educationists and literary 
men as well, regulated the movements 
of the times. And so the Peace of 
Westphalia settled not only the 
religious disputes, but solved also 
some of the political problems of the 
age and determined the boundaries 
of Spain, France, Prussia, Sweden, 
and Holland. 

The ascendancy of Sweden during 
the Thirty Years' War, and her gradual 
decadence in later times, as well as 
the development of Russia and Prussia 
as independent powers in the state- 
system of modern Europe, were due 
to circumstances created by the inter- 
41 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

national relations of all states. The 
rivalry of the French monarchs with 
the Austro- Spanish Habsburgs, the 
predominance of France as the power 
in Europe and dictator in European 
politics, and the conflicts of the Ger- 
man Emperors with the Turks, gave 
the Markgrafs of the borderlands of the 
Empire and the Slavs of the outlying 
regions opportunities to acquire an 
independent status in international 
diplomacy. The rising into importance 
of these puisne states necessarily limited 
the range of the ambition of the older 
peoples and circumscribed the field 
of their activity. In this way the 
decay of Sweden, Austria, and Turkey, 
the humiliation of the Emperor, wars 
of the Reformation, and the rise and 
development of new powers were due 
to the mutual influences upon one 
42 



INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 

another, and hence the combined 
results of the same set of conditions. 

So also the recent liberation of 
Greece from the suzerainty of Turkey, 
and the revolutions that have led 
to the establishment of the modern 
German Empire as well as the unifi- 
cation of Italy into one nation, are 
not at all due to the unassisted and 
unhindered enterprise of the peoples 
concerned, but were the consequences 
of the numerous favourable and un- 
favourable circumstances produced by 
the complexities of European politics. 

The peculiar international diplo- 
macy of England, Russia, France, and 
Turkey, by which each was pur- 
suing its own interests according to 
opportunities, gave rise to such an 
arrangement of the political forces, 
and such a distribution of the powers 
43 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

of Europe into foes, friends, and 
neutrals, as led inevitably to the 
freedom of Greece and revolutions 
in France, Germany, and Italy. 

The gradual acquisition of privileges 
by the Hungarians from the German 
Emperors, and their ultimate achieve- 
ment of national autonomy and self- 
rule, cannot be explained solely by 
the patriotism and martyrdom of 
heroes like Tokoli and his successors. 
Hungarian independence was, in later 
times, the result of the same forces 
and processes that had previously led 
to the formation and recognition of 
Prussian monarchy as an independent 
power in German history and general 
European politics. The eternal con- 
flict of the German Empire with 
Turkey, and subsequently with Russia, 
as well as the secession of Prussia 
44 



INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 

from its jurisdiction, and the conse- 
quent weakening of the Holy Roman 
Emperors, are the causes of that shift- 
ing of the centre of gravity in the 
oldest empire of the world, which is 
responsible for the new species of 
European polity, viz., the Dual 
Monarchy of Austro-Hungary. The 
expulsion of Austria from the German 
political system, and its co-ordination 
with Hungary, one of its foremost 
dependencies, are thus inextricably 
bound up with Prussian and Turkish 
politics. 

The fact that Turkey, though in- 
fidel, is still an independent unit in 
modern European politics is not to be 
explained by the innate strength of 
the Moslem national character. It is 
rather due to the change in the view- 
point of European politics that dreads 
45 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

Slavonian ambition more than the 
pagan's intolerance. The conflict be- 
tween the East and the West, the 
hatred of the European towards the 
Asiatic, the spirit of crusade against 
the Oriental religion, which were the 
mediaeval reproductions of the classical 
anti-Persian enthusiasm, have in recent 
times given place to the desire for 
security and protection of the national 
autonomies of European powers against 
the encroachments of modern Russia, 
and the recognition of the safety of 
Turkey as the concern of combined 
Europe. 

In fact, most of the non- Christian 
and Asiatic states that have been 
still preserving their independence 
in modern times are to be regarded 
as buffer-states ; and the expediency 
of extending helping hands to the 
46 



INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 

pagan nations, or of maintaining 
studied neutrality against Russian 
politics, is paralleled by the policy 
of the Pope, who in pursuance of his 
secular and political interests never 
scrupled to ally himself with Protestant 
princes and peoples, even against the 
greatest champions of his own religious 
system. 

The fact is that just as it is impossible 
for man to preserve his existence solely 
on the strength of his own psycho- 
physical system, but he has every 
moment to depend on the non-self for 
the forces and materials that supply 
food to his mind and body, and hence 
he can maintain his life and individu- 
ality so long as he is fit enough to 
utilise the environment in his own 
way; so also nations can maintain 
their existence and peculiar national 
47 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

character only so long as they are fit 
enough to profit by the thousand and 
one physical and social influences that 
constitute the environment of nations 
in the world. It is impossible that a 
people should develop its life and 
liberty by ignoring or neglecting the 
mutual alliances and enmities between 
the several peoples of the human 
society. It is impossible that a nation 
should be able to acquire or preserve 
freedom and prestige solely on the 
strength of its own resources in national 
wealth and character. Every people 
has to settle its pohcy and course of 
action by a careful study of the 
disposition of the world-forces, and 
the situation of the political centre of 
gravity at the time. 

It is this development of nations 
through international relations, and 
48 



INTERNATIONAL POLITICS 

the dependence of national destiny 
on the character of the surroundings, 
that explain why so many things in 
the history of the world seem to be 
accidental, strange, and sudden. In 
reality, these accidents in the pheno- 
mena of national rise and fall, as well 
as the variations of national character, 
are regulated by laws and are inter- 
connected as causes and effects, 
whether remote or direct, both in space 
and time. 



49 



SECTION VI 

INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS AND 
THE FORMS OF GOVERNMENTAL 
MACHINERY 

WE shall see that not only states, 
but administrative systems and 
forms and methods of government also 
are influenced and modified by the sur- 
rounding conditions of the world. As 
the State has its origin in the further- 
ance of the interests of a people, it 
grows and develops through the action 
and inter-action of the diverse antago- 
nistic and parallel forces of social life ; 
and consequently it has to adapt its 
organisation and governmental machi- 
nery to the varying circumstances of 
the environment. 

The insular position and natural 
50 



INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 

boundaries of Great Britain and 
the United States of America pre- 
serve them from foreign aggressions, 
and this explains why the principle 
of protection of the people from the 
Government operates in these countries 
more powerfully than that of pro- 
tection by the Government. And 
the centralised despotism of Louis 
XIV., which has been formulated 
into the memorable dictum, "I am 
the state," is due to quite contrary 
physical and social conditions of 
France in the seventeenth century, viz., 
the danger of the safety of the state 
owing to weak barriers. The strong 
military rule and Csesarism of the 
founders of the Prussian monarchy 
was an absolute necessity when the 
small nucleus of political life was sur- 
rounded by enemies on all sides. 
51 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

Religious intolerance and persecution 
in European history and the enforce- 
ment of a rigid system of uniformity 
in religious theory and practice were 
inevitable when the peoples of Europe 
were emerging from the conditions 
of feudalistic disintegration to the 
new national and unified socio-political 
existence. A strong monarchy exer- 
cising sway over all the spheres of 
human hfe was the only means of 
removing the decentralisation due to 
diversity and multiplicity of indepen- 
dent states, cities, and principalities. 
This need of national unity and homo- 
geneous compacture is responsible for 
the suppression of independence in 
thought, speech, and action, and 
accounts for the remarkable preponder- 
ance of the states in Spain, France, 
England, and in more recent times 
in Prussia and Hussia. 
52 



INTEENATIONAL RELATIONS 

But freedom of thought and action, 
and toleration of diversities and dis- 
unions were encouraged in India, and 
the almost absolute independence and 
autonomy of the ancient village re- 
publics were preserved here up to the 
modern age, owing to the vastness and 
physical immensity of this " epitome 
of the world," which presented un- 
surmountable obstacles to the employ- 
ment of the principles of Imperialism 
and consolidation, and necessarily gave 
ample scope for the application of 
laissez-faire and let-alone in religion, 
society, politics, and industry. 

Besides the external conditions, 
internal circumstances also regulate 
the form and spirit of the administra- 
tive machinery of a state. Lycurgus' 
military-pedagogic state was the direct 
and conscious result of the existence 
53 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

of innumerable Helots and other 
original settlers who were enslaved 
by the Dorians in the land of their 
adoption. The unruly and fanatical 
character of subjects has to be met 
by a tyrannical and inquisitorial form 
of government. " Kings have to be 
tyrants from policy when the subjects 
are rebels from principle." The exist- 
ence of diversities in religion, tribe, and 
language also necessitates the adoption 
by rulers of a policy of absolutism in 
the interests of peace and security 
of the whole territory under their 
sway. 

The "rights of man" and the prin- 
ciples of liberty, fraternity, and equality 
created opportunities for the rise of 
Napoleon ; but he began his career 
by restoring the ancien regime which 
it had been the first work of the 
54 



INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 

Revolutionists to overthrow. Napo- 
leonism becomes a political necessity 
when revolutions and disorders are 
imminent ; and not sympathy of the 
people but their terror is the object 
aimed at by the rulers. So also 
" Special Tribunals " and " Councils 
of Disorder," martial laws, and a 
thousand other engines of repression 
have always to be resorted to by suc- 
cessful revolutionists in order to crush 
the old order of sovereigns. The 
history of the French Revolution is a 
record of coercions and counter- 
coercions, by the successively rising 
governments, of the parties just 
overthrown. Even religious orders, 
societies for the promotion of economic 
good, and philanthropic organisations 
have to adopt a powerful repressive 
policy in order to concentrate their 
55 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

own strength and assert their own 
position in the society against the 
despotism of estabHshed customs and 
vested interests. Enforcement of strict 
discipHne and principles of mihtary 
organisation is the sole means of bind- 
ing together the members of a new- 
organisation for the furtherance of 
national interests. The rigorous peda- 
gogic morality among the Calvinists 
and the repression of aU individuality 
among the Jesuitical orders were the 
inevitable consequences of their posi- 
tion and responsibility as the pioneers 
and organisers of new movements. 



56 



SECTION VII 

RELATIVITY OF RELIGIOUS MOVE- 
MENTS AND OF OTHER ASPECTS 
OF HUMAN LIFE TO THE CON- 
JUNCTURE OF CIRCUMSTANCES 

WE have thus seen that the 
social and physical surround- 
ings of man leave their stamp on the 
character and extent of the state as 
well as the spirit and form of 
government. The same influence 
of the environment is to be noticed 
on the other manifestations and as- 
pects of human life as well. Just as 
the lower organisms assume different 
shapes and characteristics under the 
varying conditions of the physical 
world and preserve their identity 
57 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

and continuity under different forms 
adapted to these conditions, so also 
human hfe undergoes a variety of 
transformations according to the 
divergence of the influences and 
circumstances in the physical and 
social worlds. 

A new religion was preached by 
Mahomet in the seventh century. The 
world at the time of his advent was 
divided into innumerable principal- 
ities, the Roman and the Persian 
Empires being mere bundles or 
confederacies of independent Consul- 
ships and Vizierships. But the unity 
of godhead preached by the Arabian 
prophet became a cementing bond 
to the diverse tribes and nationalities, 
and forthwith began the process of the 
overthrow of old and the rise of new 
kingdoms. In this way the formative 
58 



RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS 

principle of one of the most powerful 
Empires of the world was supplied 
by the birth of a religion. 

So also the teachings of Christ, 
which were at first practised and de- 
veloped by a small coterie of religious- 
minded men, acquired, under the 
conditions of the world, such secular 
and political influence, that about the 
time of the decline and fall of the 
Roman Empire, the Church organi- 
sations of the Christian society alone 
were the real political authorities, 
and discharged all the important 
functions of the secular states. The 
new Teuton conquerors of the old 
Roman provinces had to place them- 
selves under the tutelage and guard- 
ianship of the Church dignitaries in 
all matters, secular as well as 
theological, educational as well as 
59 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

economic. The Frankish Empire of 
Charlemagne and the Holy Roman 
Empire of Otto the Great were the 
handiworks of such " theological politi- 
cians " and " political theologians." 
And gradually a time came when the 
Popes were the dictators of European 
politics, and controlled not only the 
religious but the political and 
financial affairs of the Empire and 
the kingdoms. Such secular presump- 
tions and political aggrandisement of 
the religious Empire are the root- 
causes of the interminable inter- 
national conflicts and civil wars of 
the Middle Ages, and intensified the 
disruptive forces of the feudal 
regime. 

Christianity and Islam thus pros- 
pered, not solely because of the needs 
of moral regeneration and spiritual 

ao 



RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS 

advancement ; but the real cause 
of their rapid progress and develop- 
ment is to be sought in that unify- 
ing force of religion as a principle 
of association which, under the 
existing conditions of the world, 
supplied some of the real needs of 
humanity. It is the absence or de- 
generation of all other institutions 
and organisations for the furtherance 
of the social, political, educational, and 
industrial interests of man, that neces- 
sitated the transformation of these 
religious associations into secular and 
military states. The origin of such 
a theocratic state out of a merely 
spiritual community has been exem- 
plified in Indian history in the case 
of the Sikhs, who, rising as a peaceful 
sect for the discovery of the means 
of spiritual emancipation and tran- 
61 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

scendental freedom from bondage, 
were compelled by the force of cir- 
cumstances to seek deliverance from 
temporal thraldom and organise 
independent secular kingdoms and 
military states like Misls and K/ialsas. 
I Manifestations of life change ac- 
I cording to variations in the environ- 
ment, and the state and religion 
alone are not the sole aspects of man. 
Human life consequently manifests 
itself sometimes in arts and literature, 
at other times in political conflicts 
and religious movements. It is this 
need of adaptation to circumstances, 
again, that explains the varieties in 
the type of philosophical and social 
systems of the different ages, and 
accounts for the divergences between 
Manu, Aristotle, and Bacon as teachers 
of humanity and pioneers of progress. 
62 



RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS 

Movements and revolutions as well 
as the truths established by them 
assume different shapes according to 
the different factors of human society. 

It is because of this diversity of 
manifestations of the vital principle 
that national life is not necessarily 
extinguished with the mere decay and 
extinction of political existence. The 
life of a people may under the force 
of circumstances have to cease to 
express itself in the field of economic 
activity and reveal itself in religious 
propagandism, or ceasing to seek reali- 
sation and development in industrial 
movements, may manifest itself in 
literature and art, or at times display 
its fulness and strength in martial 
or educational enthusiasm. 

This influence of the pressure of 
circumstances on the form of life's 
63 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

activity is to be seen also in the 
various aspects that the same ideal 
assumes in different departments of 
human enterprise. Thus what is ex- 
tremism in general thought and philo- 
sophy is idealism in art and literature ; 
is transcendentalism and mysticism 
in religion ; assumes the form of 
Socialism, a desire for equality and 
creation of opportunities for the fullest 
development of all in socio-economic 
matters ; and lastly, becomes in politics 
the principle of democratic recognition 
of the rights of every individual. Thus 
the Rights of the Individual, estab- 
lished by the French Revolution in the 
field of political action, have led to 
the declaration of the pri^dleges of the 
proletariat and the lower classes of 
society, have made literature and art 
spiritual and romantic, have established 
64 



RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS 

religion on the solid ground of social 
service and philanthropy, and by giving 
an impetus to bold, independent think- 
ing have succeeded in revolutionising 
the Sciences. 



65 



SECTION VIII 

RECAPITULATION 

RECAPITULATING, then, the 
lessons of the Science of 
History founded on Biology, we find 
that neither literary movements nor 
political agitations, neither the acqui- 
sition of Hberty nor expansion of 
territories — in fact, none of the various 
aspects of national life are absolutely 
dependent on the particular people 
concerned, all are the products and 
resultants of the mutual influences of 
all nations and national activities on 
one another ; so that types of national 
character are moulded through constant 
interactions and intercourses of life and 
thought. In the second place, these 
66 



RECAPITULATION 



international actions and reactions 
assume different aspects in different 
times and thus give rise to different 
nationalities of the human race and 
different types of national character- 
istics. In the third place, the mani- 
festations of life that give rise to various 
national types and different national 
characteristics are always varying 
both in form and spirit according to 
the varying conditions of the world; 
so that so long as man will be able to 
adapt his movements to the varying 
circumstances of the environment, 
there is no need of despair for the 
progress of humanity. 



67 



SECTION IX 

THE WORLD'S GREATEST MEN 

BUT there is a fundamental differ- 
ence between man and the lower 
organisms as regards the relations with 
the environment. Though, no doubt, 
it is the conditions in the surrounding 
world that mould and modify the life 
and form of every living organism, it is 
man alone of all created beings that can 
make his own environment and create 
the opportunities, or, at any rate, re- 
arrange the forces of the world, accord- 
ing to needs of his own development. 
Even unfavourable circumstances may 
be converted into useful instruments of 
his proper growth and progress. 

It is possible for man to realise 
68 



THE WORLD'S GREATEST MEN 

" what is not," to extend an empire 
over the physical and elemental forces 
of the world, to transcend the limita- 
tions of time and space, and regulate 
them so as to make them conform to 
his own needs, and by elevating the 
status of society to bring about a 
millennium in religion and philosophy. 
The history of civilisation is the record 
of man's will-power that has achieved 
unexpected and almost impossible 
results, by transforming unfit and 
inefficient peoples into some of the 
strongest nations of the world. 
Idealists and men of strong will-power 
like Alfred the Great, Lorenzo de 
Medici, the preachers and prophets of 
new ideas, the Roman Catholic Jesuits, 
Frederick the Great of Prussia, and 
Peter the Great and Catherine of Russia 
have succeeded in infusing a new spirit 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

into the minds of their generations, and 
enabled them to rise in the scale of 
nations by adapting themselves to the 
circumstances of the times. Religion, 
industry, state, education, and literature 
have been consciously transformed by 
the heroic efforts of such great men 
of the world, and these conscious and 
artificial transformations of the several 
aspects of social life have been the con- 
stituents of a new environment and 
thus the seeds of Renaissance. 

Thus it is not the forces and 
conditions of the existing world alone 
that govern human affairs and 
control the fortunes of movements, 
for these forces and conditions them- 
selves may be modified, re-arranged, 
and regulated by man so as to give 
rise to new circumstances and situa- 
tions. The causes of revolutions lie 
70 



THE WORLD'S GREATEST MEN 

mostly in the power of transforming 
the surrounding conditions, e.g., that 
by which man can alter the relation of 
the world-forces with one another and 
bring about new international arrange- 
ments. It is such creations of 
circumstances and new conditions in 
the environment that are really respon- 
sible for the diversity of national 
fortunes during the same age, e.g., 
industrial revolution in one country 
but political decadence in another, 
or religious propagandism among one 
people and literary enthusiasm among 
another; as well as for the diversity 
of movements and agitations among 
the same people in different ages. 
This creation of new circumstances 
and transformation of the existing 
conditions, again, explain the diversity 
of revolutions and the types of 
71 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

revolutionists in the history of the 
world, and account for the facts that 
the centre of gravity of civilisation 
has been at one time placed in India, 
at other times in China, Egypt, Greece, 
and so forth, and that Hindus, Musal- 
mans, and Christians have been in 
diverse times the "chosen races" of 
God. The fact that modern Europe 
has witnessed successively the hege- 
mony of Spain, France, and England, 
and is at present the theatre of inter- 
national diplomacy and armed neutrality 
between Germany, Russia, and En- 
gland, is to be explained by the diver- 
sities in world-politics that have been 
created by the series of facts of far- 
reaching consequence, such as the 
royal marriages of the Habsburgs, 
bigotry and intolerance of Philip II., 
protection and toleration of Elizabeth, 
72 



THE WORLD'S GREATEST MEN 

conquests and expansion of the French 
monarchy, commercial rivalry between 
the East India Companies, births of 
great men and rise of new ideas in 
Europe, desire for national self-asser- 
tion and idealistic self-sacrifice, progress 
of " enlightenment " and rationalism, 
as well as the sense of responsibility 
of pioneers that make up the several 
scenes of this complex drama. 

This possibility of the transformation 
of the environment, again, can explain 
the revolution in ideas, manners, and 
sentiments that may take place in 
human society under the forms of 
Theism, Scepticism, Christianity, Islam, 
Imperialism, Commercialism, De- 
mocracy, and Socialism. This, again, \ 
is responsible for the failures of many 
political revolutions, and accounts for 
the fact that national regeneration and 
73 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

political advancement have in all places 
had a long and chequered course. 

Ideals and phenomena of civilisation, 
then, are what man makes them to be, 
and not the chance-creations of fortui- 
tous conjuncture of circumstances. 
They are the products of environ- 
ments, in the making and regulation 
of which human will and intelli- 
gence, political rivalry and commercial 
jealousy, desire of self-assertion and 
amehoration of national condition, play 
a considerable part. Man is always 
utilising the forces and materials sup- 
plied by the physical and social environ- 
ment, re-arranging the particles of the 
universe, creating new situations out 
of old, giving rise to new environments 
for new problems, and thus helping I 
forward the opening up of new chapters/ 
of universal history. 
74 



SECTION X 

THE OUTLOOK 

THE interests of modern mankind 
are hanging on the activities of 
the " barbarians " of the present-day 
world, who, by altering the disposition 
of the forces of the universe, are silently 
helping in the shifting of its centre of 
gravity to a new position ; and on the 
transcendental heroism of those great 
men who are equipping themselves for 
the magnificent career to be built up 
by utilising the conditions thus created. 
The pioneers of the future progress 
and advancement of humanity are 
those heroes who will be able to 
make the most of the inevitable 
changes that constitute the life-history 
75 



THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY 

of the world, and create new situa- 
tions by timely and skilful readjustment 
of world influences. And so long as 
there is one man in this universe 
capable of opening up new fields 
and discovering new opportunities 
by making the necessary modifica- 
tions and re-arrangements, so long 
humanity's cause will continue to be 
broadening from " precedent to pre- 
cedent," and the interests of mankind 
widening through revolutions and 
transformations to " one increasing 
purpose" with "the process of the 
suns." 



76 



Works fty Prof, Benoy Kumar Sarkar, M.A. 

I. IN THE PRESS :- 

1. SUKRANITI— Sukracharya's System of Morals (Social, 
Economic, and Political) in Sanskrit — rendered into 
English with Introduction and Notes for the Sacred 
Books of the Hindus Series published by the Panini 
Office, Allahabad. 

2. RAJA TARANGINI— The Annals of Kashmir in 
Sanskrit by the poet-historian Kalhan, rendered into 
Bengali. 

3. Lessons on Sanskrit in English (4 parts). 

II. IN BENGALI : - 

1. Sadhana — Miscellaneous Essays (in the Press). 

2. Problems in Education (in the Press). 

3. Siksha Bijnan or The Science of Education and the 
Inductive Method of Teaching Series — 10 volumes 
already published, others in preparation. 

Sahitya Sevi. 

III. IN ENGLISH :- 

The Aids to General Culture Series — 6 volumes already 
published. 

IV. TRANSLATION OF PROF. SARKAR'S 

WORKS :- 

1. ENGLISH— Introduction to the Science of Education 
(in the Press in England). 

2. HINDI — (i) National Education in Ancient Greece. 
(ii) The Man of Letters (Sahitya Sevi). 

(iii) The Study of Language. 

THE SACRED BOOKS OF THE HINDUS 

Translated by various Sanskrit Scholars. 

Edited by Major B. D. Basu, I.M.S. (Retd.) 

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A HISTORY OF INDIAN SHIPPING AND MARITIME 
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By RADHAKUMUD MOOKERJI, M.A. 

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